"International Textile Capital" & "Smart Innovation City": Keqiao "Sharpens a Sword for Ten Years" to Build a New Era Talent Gathering Hub
Recently, the “Ke·Chuang City” 2026 Keqiao District 4th Talent Science and Technology Innovation Week series of events just concluded, followed by the 11th China Shaoxing High-Level Talent Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition at home and abroad. A series of science and innovation matchmaking, talent exchanges, and roadshows all provided a broad platform for Keqiao to attract talent and build its own nest. A decade-long journey, talent as the pen; A city transforms like a butterfly, innovation becomes the ink. In 2016, Keqiao broke the deadlock with a “big competition,” playing a march to attract talent; In 2026, the first year of the 15th Five-Year Plan, Keqiao is anchored to the overall positioning of “International Textile Capital, Smart Innovation City, and Beautiful Keqiao,” building a “Smart Innovation City” gathering talents and vibrant innovation with a decade of deep cultivation, strong integration of industry and talent, and warmth of comprehensive empowerment. This talent marathon spanning ten years is not only a vivid microcosm of Keqiao’s transformation and development, but also highlights the county’s long-term wisdom in strengthening its foundation through talent and breaking through through innovation.
In 2016, Keqiao was in the midst of the painful transformation of its traditional textile industry. A single piece of cloth supported a hundred-billion yuan output value, but it also faced the ‘growing pains’—a shortage of high-end talent, insufficient innovation momentum, and a looming ceiling in the industry. That year, the first China Shaoxing High-Level Talent Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition was launched, greatly attracting the attention of high-level talents from home and abroad, and Keqiao’s talent recruitment efforts began to break through.
Since 2016, the China Shaoxing High-Level Talent Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition has been successfully held ten times, attracting talent across more than 20 countries and regions including the United States, Germany, and the United Kingdom, with over 2,500 projects participating. Ninety-seven seeds of scientific innovation have taken root in Keqiao, with over 60% holding doctoral degrees or above.
What is even more noteworthy is the quiet upgrade in the talent recruitment logic behind the competition. Over the past decade, Keqiao has promoted “talent gathering through competitions, talent introduction through talent, talent recommendation through funds, and ecological talent acquisition.” “With a combination of strategies, each match unleashes a continuous ‘chain effect,’ truly growing into a talent ecosystem for ‘one city.’
Attracting talent through talent, using “seeds of innovation” to foster a “talent forest.” After establishing himself in Keqiao, national-level leading talent Dr. Li Junpei proactively connected them. The company recruited 3 national-level leading talents full-time, 37 with master’s or doctoral degrees or above, and more than 60 technical backbones in materials and chemical engineering. In 2025, internationally renowned advanced materials expert Khalid shut down his overseas laboratory and moved to Keqiao, thanks to the AI expert Gene, who has already settled in the Zhejiang (Shaoxing) foreign high-end talent innovation cluster·Guy’s recommendation. A leading talent brings a team, and a team links an entire industry chain—this “bring in one, bring a string” viral effect is happening more and more in Keqiao. So far, the foreign high-end talent innovation cluster has formed a “circle of friends” of settled talents Attracted and gatheredThere are now more than 20 high-level talents。
Capital is also playing a more active role. Since last year, Keqiao has established a talent science and technology innovation fund based on the Economic Development Zone and the Airport Demonstration Zone, adhering to the philosophy of “diversified cooperation and market operations.” AdoptThe “direct investment + sub-fund” dual model selects market-oriented investment institutions as fund managers, using market-oriented methods to discover and empower talent projects to grow rapidly. So far, it has partnered with five high-quality institutions, including Haiyuan Capital and Trend Capital, A total of 11 direct recognition of talent science and technology innovation projects were carried out.
The direction of talent recruitment has become increasingly precise. Focusing on the “133” modern industrial system, Keqiao has drawn up detailed plans“Talent Map” follows the map, targeting and attracting new talents, promoting the growth and growth of modern textile industries, and the clustering and growth of emerging industries such as optoelectronic information, medical health, and new composite materials. For eight consecutive years, the local government has operated special trains for talent recruitment and intelligence introduction, establishing the “Jingwei Special Project” to recruit design talents; Photovoltaic competitions and national-level composite material competitions have been held one after another, promoting the signing and settlement of high-quality projects; Medical and health industry communities are rapidly gathering. Currently, the district has introduced a total of 57 highly valued talent enterprises valued above 100 million yuan, known as “Talent+.” The “Fund + Park” model was also recognized as the best case of talent work in Zhejiang Province.
From “a match” to “a city.” What has changed is the dimension of talent attraction, but what remains is the sincerity toward talent. What started as the first attempt ten years ago has now transformed into a citywide talent attraction ecosystem—everywhere is a competition venue, and everyone is a talent scout. A decade of deep cultivation, data is the best proof: over the past decade, Keqiao has attracted and nurtured high-level talent at the provincial level and above262 people and over 260,000 skilled talents, 67 master skills studios have been established, and more than 30,000 young college graduates come to Keke each year for employment and entrepreneurship.
If talent introduction is “sowing,” then integration of industry and talent is “cultivation” and “harvesting.” Once upon a time, the common anxiety of county-level talent recruitment was whether talent introduction would not adapt to the local environment. Keqiao gives the answer with ten years of practice: talent is not an “outsider,” but a “partner” in industrial upgrading. From deepening the textile sector to expanding into optoelectronic information, advanced materials, and aerospace, the integration of industry and talent has created a multiplier effect of “introducing one talent, conquering one technology, and driving an entire industry.”
The transformation of the traditional textile industry is the most vivid footnote. Relying on the Zhejiang Modern Textile Technology Innovation Center, Keqiao has gathered a team of academicians, national-level talents, and over 400 researchers, focusing on key technologies such as carbon fiber composite materials, high-speed digital printing, and green low-carbon dyeing and printing, solving common problems in the textile industry and injecting “hardcore” technological genes into traditional manufacturing. The wisdom of top talent intertwines with Keqiao’s hundred-billion-yuan textile industry, weaving not only the fashion of fabrics but also the underlying logic for the “International Textile Capital” to move toward “intelligent manufacturing.” Led by Zhou Hongli, General Manager of Zhejiang Kekaola Textile Technology Co., Ltd., a textile technology talent introduced by Keqiao, CommittedThe research and production of fleece fabrics ranges from replacing a top American fleece fabric brand to upgrading and improving anti-static performance, long delivery times, and high prices. At the same time, the company has innovatively developed the PLA (polylactic acid) industry’s first fleece fabric, achieving numerous functional features. Also committed to technology implementation is Dr. Liu Zhenzhong from Zhejiang Kelly New Materials, who led the development of the innovative “physical activation – chemical grafting – nanocoating” technology, successfully overcoming seven key technical bottlenecks, driving the company’s output value to increase by over 3 million yuan and reducing microplastic emissions by 70%.
The cross-industry breakthrough is even more significant. In March 2026, the “Lijian 2·International Fangdu” carrier rocket was successfully launched—the birthplace of this rocket was right in Keqiao Economic Development Zone (Science and Technology City). the Zhongke Aerospace Gigafactory. From signing the project to the rollout of the first rocket’s assembly line, less than a year later, over 60% of the core R&D team holds master’s degrees or above. It is precisely this group of high-level aerospace talents that has helped Keqiao achieve a new industrial height from “weaving” to “intelligent manufacturing.” In emerging industry tracks, fields such as optoelectronic information, semiconductors, and life and health are also thriving due to talent. Breakthroughs continue in laser chips, advanced packaging, and functional new materials, with many talent enterprises growing into national “Little Giants” specialized, refined, distinctive, and innovativeand provincial-level specialized and innovative enterprises. Over the past decade, Keqiao has established 31 postdoctoral workstations and 100 postdoctoral researchers on site, covering diverse fields such as new materials, high-end equipment, and yellow wine brewing. More and more scientific research achievements have stepped out of the laboratory and into production lines, rapidly transforming into tangible momentum for industrial development. From “a piece of cloth” to “an arrow,” from a single textile support to diversified industrial advancement, and from a “manufacturing region” to an “innovative strong district,” this key leap proves the profound logic that “when talent thrives, industries thrive.”
The essence of talent competition lies in the competition between the institutional environment and the innovation ecosystem. The most profound transformation in Keqiao’s ten-year talent strategy is the government’s shift from “manager” to “enabler,” and from “passive service” to “active co-creation.” At Keqiao, “Worry-Free Entrepreneurship” is not just a promise, but a vivid practice about the future.
Taking refined services as the entry point, a full-cycle empowerment system is being built through city-talent symbiosis. Keqiao has innovatively built a “3+X” team-based talent service system, forming a dedicated “talent steward” team. This optimizes the previous cumbersome process of enterprises and talents handling affairs from multiple sources of “multiple visits, multiple connections, and repeated submission of materials” into a closed-loop service of “one-stop management, dedicated follow-up, and full-process completion,” achieving a qualitative transformation of talent services from “physical addition” to “chemical integration.” In Keqiao Economic Development Zone (Science and Technology City), anchoring Jinke Digital Intelligence City’s core positioning as a digital industry, it offers “one enterprise, one policy; one person, one plan” comprehensive customized services for tech innovation enterprises and high-level talents, precisely matching the pain points of enterprise development and talent growth. It is precisely this mechanism that has enabled the Zhongke Aerospace Super Factory project, with a total investment exceeding 10 billion yuan, to accelerate its project by 30% from signing and landing to commissioning, efficiently completing the entire process of high-end talent settlement, project approval, and policy fulfillment. It has also transformed the 33-square-kilometer Jinkeqiao Science and Technology City from a blueprint into a hub of industrial agglomeration, talent, and vibrant innovation and innovation.
Removing obstacles between industry, academia, research, and application, and promoting deep co-prosperity between talent achievements and urban industries. To solve the collaborative challenge of “industry-academia-research-application,” Keqiao District took the lead in exploring the establishment of a “enterprise-created, government-subsidized, The “Four Questions and One Evaluation” collaborative approach to the closed-loop mechanism of platform answering, workshop question verification, and market evaluation. This model opens up the transformation channel from the laboratory to the production line, allowing talent’s technological achievements to move quickly to the production line rather than “lying in papers.” At the 2026 Keqiao District Fourth Talent Science and Technology Innovation Week in Keqiao District, this mechanism was further deepened: a collaborative docking meeting for the airport pan-semiconductor industry “Four Topics and One Evaluation” was held, carrying out targeted coordination, matchmaking, and empowerment based on regional industrial characteristics.
Breaking the boundaries of talent clusters in parks and promoting the prosperity of city and talent to extend throughout the entire rural area. Keqiao breaks the traditional notion that “talent only gathers in parks,” deeply advancing the “Green Village Keqiao” initiative, guiding young talents and technical teams to return home to start businesses, and integrating innovative genes such as digital science and technology innovation, fashion design, and green technology into rural agriculture, tourism, and specialty agricultural industries, truly building a comprehensive talent ecosystem where “cities have attraction, industries have support, and people have belonging.”
Keqiao’s decade-long transformation is no accident, but the inevitable result of strategic positioning, precise policies, and deep ecological cultivation. Over the past decade, Keqiao has consistently advanced talent work in the new era with systematic and long-term thinking, from precise policy support to building a complete system, from basic living services to creating a comprehensive ecosystem, creating an attractive and competitive talent hub in all aspects, successfully forming a virtuous development cycle of “gathering talent through industry, revitalizing industry through talent, integrating industry and talent, and advancing in symbiosis.” Keqiao’s decade-long practice has fully proven that talent is the primary resource for high-quality urban development, and innovation is the core driving force for a city’s leap in capacity.
The “15th Five-Year Plan” clearly proposes to advance education, science and technology, and talent development in an integrated manner, accelerating the construction of a national strategic talent force. Standing at a new historical starting point, Keqiao will continue to deepen its strategy of strengthening the district through talent and innovation, promote integrated development of education, technology, and talent, and the deep integration of technological innovation and industrial innovation, advance the construction of the Intelligent Innovation City in depth and solidity, and demonstrate Keqiao’s responsibility and strength in the Yangtze River Delta innovation development landscape.
